Ole Miss Football Recruiting: Grading the Rebels 2023 recruiting class

The 2023 Ole Miss Football recruiting class wrapped up yesterday with college National Signing Day. While most of the Rebels’ recruiting class had already signed their letter of intent before yesterday’s event, we now have the final list of all players that will be bringing their talents to Oxford.

It was a decent day for Ole Miss football recruiting on National Signing Day. While Rebels’ head coach Lane Kiffin has put a lot of attention into the transfer portal bringing in several seasoned college vets, the Rebels’ recruiting class was still on par with some of college football’s top teams.

There wasn’t much drama for Kiffin and the Rebels yesterday like some other teams, as most of the big commitments for Ole Miss came during the early signing period back in December or sometime between.

Also, the Rebels have filled a lot of needs in the transfer portal over the last month, creating a lack of big-time breaking news in Oxford on yesterdays signing day.

While the event may have lacked fireworks for Ole Miss football, they still managed to put together a really solid recruiting class for 2023. Most recruiting outlets have the Rebels ranked somewhere between 22 and 30th overall.

Here we will give our grades on how we thought the class shook out after the conclusion of National Signing Day.

Overall recruiting class grade: B

The Ole Miss football recruiting class was ranked 22nd by On3, 26th by 247Sports, and 30th overall by ESPN. They managed to secure one 5-star recruit (Suntarine Perkins), six 4-star recruits, and eight 3-stars including five total recruits ranked in the ESPN 300.

This was enough to give them an average grade of 89.58. For reference, the consensus top three classes overall, Alabama, Georgia, and Texas had average grades of 94, 93, and 92 respectively.

The Rebels also secured the state’s first and second-ranked overall players (Perkins and Ayden Williams), a huge win to keep in-state talent and win them over the in-state rival Bulldogs.

Number of 5-Star Prospects: B+

This class is headlined by the Rebels’ lone 5-star recruit Suntarine Perkins. It may seem peculiar to have a grade of B+ when Ole Miss only secured one 5-star player, but that’s because 5-star players don’t grow on trees, and if you are not Alabama or Georgia a 5-star player can be hard to come by.

To show just how rare securing 5-star commitments can be, only about half of the top 30 recruiting classes contained a 5-star recruit. The six teams ranked directly ahead of Ole Miss didn’t have one. Only about a quarter of the top 30 classes contained more than one.

Outside of the top 10 ranked recruiting classes, there was a total of ten 5-star players between every other college football program combined. Alabama, Georgia, and Texas had 18 total 5-star recruits just between the three of them. Securing even one 5-star recruit is a big deal.

Number of 4-Star Recruits: C-

As mentioned above, Ole Miss was able to secure six total 4-star recruits. While this is about on par for teams whose classes ranked in the 20-30 range, it is well below many other SEC teams.

Alabama, Georgia, and Florida had almost 20 each. LSU had 16. Most of the SEC recruiting classes ranked ahead of Ole Miss fell somewhere in the 10-15 range for 4-stars committed, so six total isn’t going to cut it long-term when you compete in the SEC west.

All in all, this was a reasonably successful recruiting cycle for head coach Lane Kiffin and Ole Miss football. Combining the big-time transfers that made their way to Oxford along with a top-25 recruiting class, there is reason to be optimistic about the state of the Ole Miss football program going forward.